Setting The Tone with Guilaine Goujon

A graduate of the renowned EFAP school for new media professions, Guilaine started her career with the media group TRACE, which she joined in 2013 as an international press officer to manage the visibility of the group's brands, networks, channels, products and events in over 160 countries. She joined Believe in 2017.

What is your role at Believe and how have you evolved within the company?

I joined the French branch of Believe as a press officer in the Label & Artists Solutions department. For yes, at that time, there was a promotion department on the distribution side! The press promotion was an offer proposed to the artists who asked for it. Then I joined the Artist Services team when it was created in 2018. It was really the beginnings because there were only two project managers and me as a press officer. I then moved up the ranks, first becoming Press Manager before becoming Head of Promotion in 2020. The promotion team has grown and Artists Service is a world away from its beginnings with only three people!

What are the strategies you implement to build and increase the notoriety of the artists?

In fact, no two strategies are the same. There are as many strategies as there are artist profiles. It all depends on their careers, their objectives... It can be a notoriety strategy, a repositioning strategy, an image strategy, a reputation strategy. For example, notoriety strategies concern most of the time artists in development. The approach will be different in the case of an artist who has passed a milestone in fame: we will work on his image for his new audience, we will not necessarily choose the same media channels or the same formats to do so, the discourse might have shifted. But for each strategy, the crucial idea is really to know which media to use, which audience to target, what message to give and when to give it.

How do you manage the day-to-day relationships with the artists you work with?

The main idea is to build trust, a trust based on both expertise and transparency. My own line of conduct is to be totally transparent with the artists, to always tell them everything about the media feedback or how to get where they want to go. Before suggesting a strategy to an artist, there is a lot of discussion, in order to have a better analysis of who s/he is and what s/he wants. This helps create a mutual understanding. When we share our expertise with an artist, when we detail a strategy built around what he or she wants, which shows that we have understood and listened to him or her, and that we are working in his or her best interests, then a real relationship of trust is established. And that's the key to everything.

Your job is a "classic" job in the music industry, how do you rely on the technologies developed by Believe?

On paper, it is indeed a classic occupation found in many record companies or labels, but in reality, it is a job in constant evolution. Today, in the field of promotion, we have to reconcile contradictory imperatives, because it requires more technology and more human touch. More technology because we rely on data to build an audience and more human touch because there is a part of storytelling in what the artists tell. At Believe, things are pretty well done because I can rely on technologies, and even more on expertise. We build press relations or promotion strategies that combine social, influence and media. When I need to rely on social, I turn to Digital Marketing, I also turn to them and Brand Marketing for influence, to the Editorial & Marketing Partnerships teams because we do similar jobs. All these expertises are added values today to promote an artist.

Do you feel that the communication of artists has evolved in recent years, especially with social networks that brings the artist much closer to his fans?

Yes, the way artists communicate has changed: with social networks, any word, image or video can take on unexpected proportions. And on the other hand, it opens the field of possibilities, they are in direct contact with their public. However, it will not replace the media in the sense that it is a question of reaching an audience that has not yet been acquired. Finally, social networks are also the gateway and storefront for some media.

What advice would you give to a young artist who wants to increase his visibility?

First of all, I would advise him to know what he wants and what he wants to show. And to surround himself with the right people. The notoriety goes far beyond promotion: it's digital, marketing, branding, merchandising... And all of this is built with a team. So know where you're going, and choose the right people.

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